


Tony's Shitty Day

by TenSpencerRiedPlease



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Divergence - Post-Avengers (2012), Domestic Avengers, Domestic Fluff, Gen, I Don't Even Know, M/M, Post-Avengers (2012), Prompt Fic, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-18
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2019-08-04 01:55:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16337519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TenSpencerRiedPlease/pseuds/TenSpencerRiedPlease
Summary: Tony remembers all those horror stories people used to tell back when he was in college about terrible roommates and he thinks he really lucked out rooming with Rhodey given his situation now. Some of the Avengers, they’re clean, but Clint? The man is a fucking shit storm of mess.He pulls fuck knows what out of the sink of the shared Avengers floor, staring at it for a moment before he recognizes coffee grounds at least. “Who stuck coffee grounds in the sink? What, am I running a bed and breakfast for a biker gang?” he asks.





	Tony's Shitty Day

**Author's Note:**

> Original Prompt: Post Averages pre everything else, Tony's having a bad day, 1st the team is crashing at his tower, the media is adding to the rumor mill and to top it off is Arc Reactor if shorting out in the middle of dinner and peppers not around to help him change it out really he just wants to bang his head against the table, knocked himself out and end this god-forsaken day but when the team goes into panic mode over him he can't help but laugh...What is his life, this is apparently.
> 
> Its kind of this, less with the team freaking out and more with them noticing that Tony is upset and trying to be nice to him lol. Bonus Tony/Rhodey.
> 
> Named 'Tony's shitty day' because we're adults here (or at least old enough to swear if you're teens) so we can use the adult version of 'Tony's no good, very bad, terrible day'. Less wordy this way lol.

Tony remembers all those horror stories people used to tell back when he was in college about terrible roommates and he thinks he really lucked out rooming with Rhodey given his situation now. Some of the Avengers, they’re clean, but Clint? The man is a fucking  _shit storm_  of mess and Thor isn’t much better when he's around. Natasha and Steve are, thankfully, very much sticklers for cleanliness and they mitigate the damage quite a lot but he still had to give his cleaning staff a good raise because he felt bad for them. Cleaning up after him is enough work, cleaning up after Clint should earn them a six figure annual income.

He pulls fuck knows what out of the sink of the shared Avengers floor, staring at it for a moment before he recognizes coffee grounds at least. “Who stuck coffee grounds in the sink? What, am I running a bed and breakfast for a biker gang?” he asks. No one seems to hear his comment and he rolls his eyes. He throws out the... whatever that was with the coffee grounds on it and decides hiding in his lab is a necessary thing for the day.

They’ve got a dinner event later, but for now he can hide with his machines and they don’t leave mess all over that require him to give workers raises and they also don’t leave coffee grounds and other mysteries in the sink. Time off is necessary so he makes his way down to the lab, smiling when Dummy rolls up, claw spinning happily. He’s three steps into the room when JARVIS speaks.

“Sir, there are rumors of you and Miss. Potts dating again,” he says and Tony rolls his eyes. Poor Pep, she deserves better than this.

“That’s not really new,” he points out.

“There’s a picture,” JARVIS tells him. “Doctored, obviously.”

Yeah, obviously, but Tony lets out a long sigh and throws himself in his desk chair. “Call Rhodey,” he tells the AI. Rhodey is off doing... something, Tony has a hard time keeping up given that Rhodey is constantly on the fly, literally, with the suit. He doesn’t think he’d believe any stupid tabloids anyways but its always good to check in.

When Rhodey answers the phone he’s laughing. “How the hell did you convince Pepper Potts to kiss your sorry ass?” he asks and Tony relaxes a little, pleased that Rhodey has maintained his sense of humor.

“I didn’t, obviously,” he tells Rhodey.

Rhodey lets out a small hum. “Well okay baby, but this looks pretty convincing. Does Pepper know yet?” he asks.

“She’s currently in Japan so probably not, no. She isn’t going to be happy,” he says. She’s forever annoyed that people can’t seem to accept that sometimes women can be good friends with men and have no desire to sleep with them. She claims that she’s spent too much time cleaning Tony’s messes to find wanting to  _become_  one of his messes appealing. Tony knows that doesn’t really matter if someone is interested thanks to Rhodey not that people really know about their relationship. Its been an on again off again thing for years, since they were kids really, but after Afghanistan something changed.

And really, the media deciding Rhodey was just a good friend after risking his entire  _career_  to spend three  _months_  tracking Tony down? That’s probably one of the biggest romantic gestures Tony has ever seen and somehow people managed to ‘no homo’ it. Pepper finds that annoying too but mostly only because people have made  _her_  the love interest. At first Tony thought it was kind of funny because he used to have a bit of a crush on Pepper. Now both he and Pepper find it annoying but Rhodey still keeps a sense of humor about it. Maybe its because of all that time spent in the military or something- Tony knows he’s had to deal with a lot of shit and he tends to use humor to do it. Not as much as Tony, but his endless optimism is one of his finer qualities.

“Well,” Rhodey says, “guess she will also be unhappy to hear about your summer wedding.”

Tony sits straight up and lets out an irritated noise. “People are fucking seriously saying we’re engaged? Are you fucking kidding me?” he asks. So much for his day getting better.

“Aw, don’t be like that baby. We can get married in the summer if you want to,” Rhodey jokes.

Neither of them would want to sweat their asses off in a suit in the damn summer so absolutely not.

*

After dealing with the social media  _mess_  on both his and Pepper’s end Tony figures maybe,  _maybe_  the food will cheer him up. Yeah, maybe Steve is being more annoying than usual and yeah, maybe Clint chews with his mouth open and it makes Tony want to crawl back into that worm hole his nerves are being grated so hard, but food is food. Its comfort and it tastes good, can’t go wrong there.

That lasts all of five god damn minutes when he feels that familiar loss of energy around his heart and fucking  _great_. He’s got three hours before the reactor dies out completely and half that time would be spent getting back to the lab. And Pepper isn’t around to help him change it out either so... well fuck, he doesn’t know.

He excuses himself to the bathroom so he can try and figure something out or, hell, he has no idea. He’ll burn that bridge when he gets to it.

He’s there for five seconds when he turns around and jumps when he finds Natasha there. “Did you not notice the lack of a dress on the door’s stick figure?” he asks.

Natasha rolls her eyes, “I know where the women’s bathroom is, and I also happen to know you’re probably not likely to hang out in there so here I am. What’s going on?” she asks.

Like she cares. He bites back the snappy response though because its not really helpful right now. “The reactor is dying, I need to swap it out in the lab except I’m pretty far away obviously and I don’t have small enough hands to replace it anyways so I guess I’ll die,” he says. It’s over dramatic and ridiculous but he’s tired, okay. Its been a shitty day.

“I have small hands,” Natasha says, holding up hands that might actually be smaller than Pepper’s.

“No offense but I don’t want you near my heart. You might rip it out,” he says. There’s no real malice in his voice and sure, after the stunt she pulled he’s not overly trusting, but its Natasha’s general personality that drew him to that conclusion rather than their past.

“Please, Stark, I have bigger fish to fry. Lets go, you don’t have a whole lot of time to get that thing replaced,” she says.

He considers saying no but beggars can’t be choosers.

*

Natasha is subjecting him to some Russian shit when the rest of the team gets home. Clint looks a little sheepish, Steve has got that ‘aw shucks’ look on his face, and Bruce looks a little constipated. Basically, as far as Tony can gather, they look like they feel bad but he has no idea why. He decides to ignore them in favor of watching his heart for any signs that Natasha somehow tampered with the reactor for funsies.

“I’m not guaranteeing that stuff won’t end up in the sink,” Clint says, shuffling a little awkwardly. It takes a moment for Tony to realize he’s talking to him.

“Clint, what the fuck  _is_  this?” Steve asks, holding up what looks like an honest to god squirrel. Frankly the fact that Steve has resorted to swearing speaks volumes.

Clint examines the strange sink object and then shrugs. “Dunno.”

Steve throws the mystery object back in the sink. “No wonder Tony is pissed off at you,” he mumbles.

Tony frowns at this and Natasha lets out a soft laugh, “Stark, you’re not subtle. clearly something has been pissing you off all day and it wasn’t hard to look through the camera footage.”

When the hell had she done  _that_? He’ll ask JARVIS later and make it harder for her to get into his systems. “I’m not pissed off at anyone,” he mumbles. Its mostly true, he’s just frustrated because he’s had a bad day. If they were mostly the ones to cause it, well. Okay so today it was mostly Clint but still.

“Are so,” Steve says, “you’ve been avoiding us all day.”

He has not. Which he tells them but even Bruce looks confused. “This morning you gave us all a bunch of dirty looks and then went and hid in your lab to call Pepper,” he says.

Tony squints, “why would I call Pepper?” he asks. Actually he has to call her to find out how her meetings went but she’s better at remembering these things than him so for all he knows she’ll call him before he gets around to contacting her.

Steve frowns, “well, you’re you know... together,” he says, turning a little red as he says it.

He opens his mouth to tell them all that  _no_ , he and Pepper are not together but Natasha speaks instead. “You two are horrible at reading romantic cues. He’s with  _Rhodes_ , not Pepper,” she says.

Tony narrows his eyes at her, wondering when the hell she figured that out because he damn well knows he hides it well. For Rhodey’s sake mostly- the military might be a lot less homophobic now but its hard to forget what that oppressive environment is like and also Tony doesn’t want to ruin Rhodey’s career over something so stupid.

‘What?” Bruce asks, frowning. “When did that happen?”

“Why are you looking at me, Bruce? I don’t know,” Natasha says.

Tony opens his mouth, shuts it, and then sighs. “Please stop leaving questionable objects in the sink, Steve clean the fucking work out equipment-  _you_  might be attractive sweaty but the damn equipment isn’t. Natasha, stop using all the coffee and not replacing it and Bruce, stop putting the milk back in the fridge empty. I have had people do literally everything for me my entire life, if I don’t have any of these bad habits you can all be broken of them,” he says. He doesn’t mention the fifteen years Rhodey’s mom spent breaking him of the same habits minus the work out equipment.

“I maintain no guarantees with the sink,” Clint says.

Steve gives him a  _look_ , “there will be no more road kill in the sink. Its unsanitary,” he says like  _that_  should be the primary concern.

*

Bruce and Steve are fighting over the empty milk carton when the elevator makes that irritating dinging noise that Tony, for some reason, thought it was a good idea. He turns and finds Rhodey standing there grinning at him. “Hey,” Tony says, walking over and, mostly out of habit, dragging him away from prying eyes.

“You know the easiest way to solve the Pepper Problem is to just... tell people we’re together,” Rhodey tells him and Tony stops.

“What?” he asks. “Wait, when did you get to America?” As far as he knew Rhodey was overseas. 

Rhodey snorts, “for a genius you’re always slow to pick up on things. I flew here, obviously. Suit’s faster than a plane,” he says.

Yeah, Tony knows. Neither of them have ever been fond of planes and travel time so he’d purposefully made the suits fast. Also he likes going fast. “I... you... what’s with the change in heart?” he asks and Rhodey frowns.

“What change in heart?” he asks.

Tony frowns, “you’ve never wanted to come out with our relationship,” he says and Rhodey gives him a funny look.

“Baby, I’ve  _always_  wanted to be out with it. I thought you didn’t.”

Tony rubs his temples because his day has been long and not good and apparently now its ending with a fucking twenty year long miscommunication. “And the military problem?” he asks.

Rhodey snorts, “we’re actual ass superheroes and if they want access to that suit, and they  _do_ , they need me. No idiot will fire me for being bisexual no matter how much I know a few will want to.”

Okay, good point. “Well, that’s the reason I thought you wanted to keep things quiet. You’ve worked hard, seems like a shame to ruin it all over a stupid relationship,” he says.

He knows he’s said something wrong when a few beats of silence go by. He sighs, guessing this is his day taking another turn for the worst. “Tony,” Rhodey says softly. “I don’t think this relationship is some kind of stupid fling and I know you don’t. I love you Tony, have for most of my life,” he murmurs.

Tony smiles and presses his face into Rhodey’s chest. Usually he resents being so short, but at times like this its kind of nice to be the small one. Rhodey wraps his arms around him and they remain like that for a moment. “You know what sounds a lot better than ‘we’re dating’? ‘This is my fiancee, stop acting like I’m dating my assistant’,” he says and Rhodey snorts.

“Is this a proposal, Stark?” he asks and Tony nods, pulling a ring out of his pocket and Rhodey’s eyebrows shoot up.

“How long have you have that on you?” he asks.

He grins a little and looks away. “Sine ‘98,” he admits. Thankfully Rhodey thinks its funny and takes the ring.

*

“No horror movies, I do not like those,” Steve tells Natasha, looking somewhat like a frightened golden retriever.

“I’m with Cap,” Rhodey says fast. Natasha looks at him and Tony wrinkles his nose.

“Not for me,” he says. Steve looks shocked that they’ve agreed on something but he doesn’t know about that time he and Rhodey thought dropping acid and watching Nightmare on Elm Street was a good plan. They might both be geniuses but they aren’t fucking smart, that’s for sure.

“All of you minus Tony a little bit have been in  _wars_  but you’re afraid of horror movies?” Clint asks, shaking his head.

“Wars don’t involve demonic possession, Clint,” Rhodey says, shaking his head.

“Well, some of those Nazi experiments... Horror movies are creepy,” Steve settles on, changing the subject before things got overly awkward. “We should watch Matilda! Sam says its good,” he says.

Rhodey wrinkles his nose, “no. We should watch James Bond, any Bond will do,” he says.

“We should watch The Sound of Music,” Clint says and Bruce gives him a  _look_.

“No, we should watch Gravity. Sandra Bullock was good in that,” he says.

“We’re watching Sharknado,” Natasha says and Clint lets out a noise of excitement as the rest of them wrinkle their noses.

“Natasha, I forbid that,” Steve says, apparently throwing out a desperate bid for leadership over movie choices.

“Eat my ass,” Natasha tells him. “JARVIS, play the movie.”

Rhodey sighs, “I should have stayed in Egypt for the layover,” he mumbles.

**Author's Note:**

> [My writing Tumblr](https://tenspencerriedplease.tumblr.com/)


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